Objectives

Examine whether a death-in-police-custody incident affected community reliance on the police, as measured through citizen calls requesting police assistance for non-criminal caretaking matters.

Methods

This study used Baltimore Police Department (BPD) incident-level call data (2014–2017) concerning non-criminal caretaking matters (N = 234,781). Counts of non-criminal caretaking calls were aggregated by week for each of 279 unique sections derived from census-tract and police district boundaries. This study devised a Negative Community–Police Relationship Index Score that operationalized the expected risk of a negative community–police relationship for each of the sections. In April 2015, a Baltimore resident, Freddie Gray, died while in BPD custody. A Poisson regression model assessed whether this high-profile death-in-police-custody incident adversely affected the volume of non-criminal caretaking calls to the police and whether that effect was strongest in sections at a high risk of a negative community–police relationship. A falsification test used pocket-dialed emergency calls to verify that any observed trends were not the result of overall telephone usage.

Results

There was no statistical evidence that the death-in-police-custody incident produced any changes in community reliance on the police for non-criminal caretaking matters, even in high-risk sections. A supplemental analysis using calls for criminal matters yielded similar results. As the falsification test demonstrated, the observed trends were not the result of overall telephone usage.

Conclusions

Despite a divisive death-in-police-custody incident, citizens were still willing to enlist police assistance. More broadly, the caretaking role of the police may be an important mechanism to strengthen community–police relations, particularly in marginalized neighborhoods vulnerable to strained community–police relations.

中文翻译：

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警察在押死亡事件对社区对警察的依赖的影响

目标

检查通过民警请求就非刑事照料事宜向警方提供帮助的公民呼吁，衡量死刑看守事件是否影响了社区对警察的依赖。

方法

这项研究使用了巴尔的摩警察局（BPD）涉及非犯罪看护事项的事件级别呼叫数据（2014-2017）（N = 234,781）。按普查区和警察区边界划分的279个独立部分中的每个部分，按周汇总了非犯罪性看护电话的计数。这项研究设计了一个负面的社区-警察关系指数评分，用于计算每个部分的负面的社区-警察关系的预期风险。2015年4月，巴尔的摩居民Freddie Gray在BPD拘留期间去世。Poisson回归模型评估了这一备受瞩目的警察死亡保管事件是否对警察的非犯罪看护电话数量产生了不利影响，以及在社区与警察之间存在消极关系的高风险地区中，这种影响是否最明显。

结果

没有统计证据表明，即使在高风险地区，死刑看守事件也改变了社区对警察在非犯罪照料方面的依赖。使用对刑事事项的呼吁进行的补充分析得出了相似的结果。证伪测试表明，观察到的趋势并非电话总体使用的结果。

结论

尽管发生了分裂性的治安拘留事件，但公民仍然愿意争取警察的协助。从更广泛的意义上讲，警察的照料作用可能是加强社区与警察关系的重要机制，特别是在容易遭受紧张的社区与警察关系的边缘化社区。